Ximian was a company that provided free software desktop applications for Linux and Unix based on the GNOME platform. Ximian (previously called Helix Code, and before that International Gnome Support, although this name was apparently only used during the planning stage) was founded by Miguel de Icaza and Nat Friedman in October 1999, and was bought by Novell on August 4, 2003. Novell intends to continue and extend development of all Ximian's current projects using the Ximian name, whilst adding support for its own GroupWise and ZENworks software.
Ximian both developed new products and "polished" existing free software projects to provide more consistent operation. These projects are packaged into its Ximian Desktop product — a range of integrated applications intended to provide all the tools a typical business user might require. So-called "Ximianized" versions of GNOME, OpenOffice.org, and Gaim were released, along with the following completely new products:
